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Dordt College Men's Basketball vs. Northwestern

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(Orange City, Iowa) The Dordt College Defenders stayed perfect in the Great Plains Athletic Conference with an 85-80 overtime win over in-county rival Northwestern Tuesday night at the Bultman Center.

The Defenders, playing without Scott Van Zanten because of an eye injury, and losing three players to fouls with substantial time left, fought the Red Raiders off for their second win in the conference and seventh in a row.

The two teams battled to a 17-17 stalemate through the first 10:30 of the game before Dordt College outscored Northwestern 9-1 to 26-18. Five of the nine points came on free throws as Dordt College shot 20 free throws in the first half, making 13. Northwestern, playing without the GPAC 2005-2006 player of the year, Chad Schuiteman for much of the first half because of fouls, trimmed the lead to 35-31 at halftime with TJ Phillips, a late addition to the Northwestern roster making a three-pointer on Northwestern's last possession of the first half. Dordt had as much as a ten point lead in the first half at 31-21.

The Defenders led by as many as 12 five minutes into the second half on free throw by Eric Miedema and were up by 11, 58-47 with 10:19 remaining. From there the Raiders charged back. Scoring seven in a row the Raiders made it 58-54. A three-pointer by Derek Keizer ended the run but the Raiders followed that with an eight point run to lead 62-61 with 6:28 left in the game. With the tide turned, Logan Kingma made a basket to retake the lead at 63-62. The game then featured ties at 63 and 66. Another Kingma jumper tied it at 68 with 2:18 left. A Mark De Younge jumper gave Northwestern a two point lead but Kingma responded again with a jumper to tie it at 70 with 1:24 left in regulation. Northwestern missed two free throws with 1:10 left and the Defenders couldn't convert on a last-second try, sending the game to overtime.

In the extra session the Defenders trailed early when Andrew Stimson drained a three-pointer but Dordt answered immediately with a Kingma lay-up. Trading buckets, the two teams played as free-flowing of basketball in the first three minutes of the extra session. Dordt was without the services of Derek Keizer and Brian Eekhoff in the overtime as the two starters were disqualified on fouls, Eekhoff with 2:36 left and Keizer with 2:24 remaining. Dordt took the lead for good on a Russ Griese putback and foul shot at 79-77 and Mark Rowenhorst, Eric Van Maanen and Chad Huenink went a combined 6-6 from the free throw line in the final :27 to seal the win.

Dordt made 27-40 free throw attemps including 7-8 in overtime while Northwestern made 23-42 including 8-21 in the second half and 3-4 in overtime.

Dordt was paced by Eric Van Maanen's 19 points and Russ Griese had 13, including the first eight points for Dordt in the game. Chad Huenink and Logan Kingma both had 12 and Keizer had 11 poins and four assists. Eric Miedema had three assists in relief of Keizer.

Northwestern was topped by Kale Wiertzema's18 poitns and six rebounds while Schuiteman had 13 points and eight rebounds. Northwestern held a slight 44-43 edge on the boards with Huenink snaring eight. Brian Eekhoff chipped in with seven points before fouling out.

Dordt College is now 7-1 overall and 2-0 in the GPAC and have won seven in a row. The Defenders have also won three games over Northwestern at the Bultman Center in the past five years.

Dordt will face Morningside on Wednesday, November 29 in their next outing while Northwestern travels to Buena Vista this Saturday.